Hyrule Warriors Is "Zelda Musou" In Japan

Here’s an interesting little tidbit. This morning, Nintendo announced Hyrule Warriors, a Legend of Zelda spin-off being developed in collaboration with Tecmo Koei, who publish the Dynasty Warriors games.

While Nintendo haven’t settled upon an English title for the game yet—“Hyrule Warriors” is a placeholder—in Japan, the game’s title appears to be finalized. It’s called Zelda Musou, and it even has a logo.

That’s a fairly straightforward title, and it’s in line with most other “Warriors” games in Japan, such as Dynasty Warriors (Sangoku Musou), Samurai Warriors (Sengoku Musou), Dynasty Warriors: Gundam (Gundam Musou) and One Piece: Pirate Warriors (One Piece: Kaizoku Musou).

Hyrule Warriors—or maybe they’ll actually include “Zelda” in the title at some point in the west—is planned for release sometime in 2014.

I thought the exact same thing upon witnessing the trailer in the direct for the first time. I do wonder how much potential there is, though. If I recall, Musou titles have been on a downward trend, and recent Zelda titles haven’t impressed in Japan either. Ocarina of Time 3D did quite well, but Wind Waker HD performed very poorly, and Zelda Musou will be on the same console as the latter. I feel like western fans will be a lot more enthusiastic about this title than Japanese fans, ironicly. I won’t say this was a bad idea, but I do think this kind of experiment should have been attempted a while ago, when Musou games were a lot more popular.

If I recall, Musou titles have been on a downward trend, and recent Zelda titles haven’t impressed in Japan either.

It certainly should be interesting, yeah. I haven’t had the time to go back through our sales column’s archives and look up the last few Warriors’ games, but Zelda definitely does have more to gain from this than Warriors does in the west.

In the case of the Warriors games in the west, they have a small fanbase that is interested in buying each new one that comes out. Hyrule Warriors may get a few of those fans buying the game, but it won’t help the Warriors series itself. However, what it will do is show people that Zelda as a brand can be more diverse than it has been these past few years, and get people talking about it.

In Japan, yeah, Zelda hasn’t exactly been super popular, but I feel as though there is still potential for growth. Phantom Hourglass did very well (perhaps because of the DS itself) while Ocarina 3D did well on 3DS. Meanwhile, on consoles, Twilight Princess is still selling little by little and was included in Amazon’s best-selling Wii games this year.

Meanwhile, Skyward Sword and Spirit Tracks both bombed, but I feel like those might be due to the state of the platform and certain bad design decisions rather than the Zelda brand itself. Link Between Worlds is out in Japan this week, so let’s see how that does.

FitzpatrickPhillips

So its true that Zelda is more popular here?

GH56734

Aside from a short-lived surge in popularity for Phantom Hourglass in Japan… yes. Zelda is not as popular in Japan than in the US/Europe.
Nintendo even said around 2003 that the series was in fact considered for cancellation had the good overseas sales not saved it.

ndjn3979

I may consider Wii U just for this.

idrawrobots

Stuff like this makes me think that NOA is too disengaged from game development.

ffboi7

Nah I think its more of they want to give Zelda fans something to tide them over while they continue to work on LoZ Wii-U. Since its being made by a 3rd party developer they don’t have to take any attention away from Wii-U Zelda.while this game is being made at the same time.

idrawrobots

I mean that the Japanese version’s name seems to be final but we only have a tentative title. It feels like, Nintendo in Japan just told NOA about this yesterday and they quickly came up with a placeholder name and horrible logo at the end of the teaser trailer.

NeptuniasBeard

Well that’s not entirely fair. “Zelda Musou” is pretty much an “Exactly What’s On the Tin” title for the japanese, so it’s not like Nintendo had to flex any muscles. Localizing the name will take time

Link

They need to create a name that exemplifies both the Zelda brand and Warriors brand while appealing to the western market. In Japan having a name is so much easier at it follows the same naming scale i.e One Piece Kaizoku Musou, Troy Musou, Hokuto Musou, etc etc.

ShawnOtakuSomething

So this is the great Triforce war

James Enk

i hope the put a nice plot in it that will be meaningful to the overall story of the series like a big war or something

Kaihaku

That’s what I’m hoping. It would be awesome if that’s the Hero of Time’s dad in the trailer.

J_Joestar

So who will be the Lu Bu/Tadakatsu Honda of this game?

PersonaSpace

Tingle.

Lynx

Ganondorf save us all.

Servant BerserCAR

We’re so screwed.

fyi1191

Zelda.

$1392518

Serious note, the Hero’s Spirit.

Yan Zhao

Fierce Deity Link :D

ffboi7

This guy will be their Lu Bu D:

Serephitus

I find this rather hilarious

tubers

Saw the trailer.

Not a Zelda fan but I like what I’ve seen. Dude looks badass coming from baby art from the last game.

Kinda feel bad for the hardcore fans tho.. some doesn’t seem to be receptive of this.

I doubt it. That would make it seem like a main title which they are assuring its not.

Hau To

Who will even be the playable characters in this game besides Link?

idrawrobots

Hopefully Capitan Falcon.

evilmajikman

Ganondorf, Zelda, Sheik, Majora, Vaati, Agahnim, Nabooru, Twinrova, Darmani, Yuga, true form Midna, Impa, and that’s all I can list for right now.

ffboi7

Ganon will finally be able to use his sword in something D:

idrawrobots

4 Links at the same time!

ffboi7

NEW 4 SWORDS!

J_Joestar

There is also the question of “how many Links will show up?”

Brimfyre

I like Hyrule Warriors, but NOA is too focused on branding everything to be completely bland and lifeless.

Legend of Zelda Warriors U, I imagine what the final title will be.

Sylveria

Ugh, I really hope not. But.. you’re probably right.

bushin

I just nearly made a mess in my pants. Two of my favorites combined! I thought it couldn’t get any better then gundam musou then one piece came and blew me away. Now zelda too?! Definitely a wii U game changer so if this comes out in EU I’ll have to get a wii U

almostautumn

Talk about blatant commercial interests

Yan Zhao

Zelda: Hyrule Warriors. Would be just like One Piece: Pirate Warriors in its naming scheme.

But yeah, hype, time to buy a Wii U :D

Freud_Hater

…So what’s Hyrule Warriors about? ‘___’

J_Joestar

Probably more of a tribute to Zelda games, with battles based around events from the main line games.

ffboi7

Well considering its a spinoff I don’t think the story will be its main focus

brian

Holy crap

Nice Boat Quatro

Are you floating or something?

Virevolte

Damn, so it wasn’t just a pigeon’s…

NightzeroAX

Fierce Diety Link please.

Kaetsu

They should have masks from Majora’s Mask as items you can equip.

Marco Tinè

Nice idea, I hope they`ll consider things like these in the game design

Warboss Aohd

It’s funny, i asked for a game where Link led an army against Ganon’s……….and here it is.

Wasn’t expecting a Dynasty Warriors game, but still i guess this counts.

Guess they don’t want another Smash Bros? I don’t really care about that series because I only care about a handful of the characters in there. Not everyone is in to every single thing Nintendo franchise, so this will be a nice target focused game.

Eder García

i guess you are right,, the Wonderful 101 was supposed to be an all star Nintendo game right?

Mr_SP

I don’t know if it would be a very big game, because of that. What could we possibly expect as playable characters? Link, Zelda, Ganondorf… Who else? Sheik? Multiple Links? Minor characters? I just don’t see how much content they could actually put in it.

Kaihaku

For good campaigns there are all of the Sages from Ocarina of Time, the “three musketeer” characters from Twilight Princess, and so on. Basically, any NPC with some combat skill from any of the games could be playable. Warriors games have a history of usually being pretty free in converting characters into fighters so the range might even be broader than that.

If there are evil campaigns there’s Skull Kid, Agahnim, Vaati, Zant, and so on. Of course I’m sure that Dark Link will make an appearance.

Lumi

Yeah, any NPC with NO “cannon” combat skills can be in. The history musou games all feature a lot of women who definitely where not fighters.

shenlong234

What’s next, Final Fantasy Warriors?

Vash bane

shh they might hear you

Eder García

with Lightning as the main character, PS Vita only

Kamen Rider Rayz

as well as PS4, XBOX ONE and Wii-U *cough cough*

Kamen Rider Rayz

Why not? I’ll be more happier and screaming excitingly than ever if that awesome game would be made in the future!! Imagine when you play as Cloud, Squall, Sephiroth, Zidane, Tidus, Lightning and other characters slashing your thousand enemies with massive combos and satisfactory at its best! In order to get the BEST ending, defeat the Devil King, Chaos as a true final boss of the game! More weapons, varieties of weapons to choose from, many different types
of Musou to choose from, more stages from FF universe, more cutscenes, customization mode just like FF13 Lightning Returns for ALL characters, etc.! Sora from Kingdom Hearts as one of the DLC characters! :D

GameTaco

Disgaea Warriors/Makai Musou. That will be the crossover to make me drop everything and buy a Sony console.

Lumi

Hyrule Musou would be a more appropriate name, but I guess “Zelda” looks more recognizable than “Hyrule” to the Japanese.